I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream!

I forgot about these pictures taken at promenade park in Maldon long long ago during the summer holidays until downloading some other photos onto the computer. There's some ice cream related signage which always seems to have a certain charm. I've always wanted to own an ice cream van complete with lightey-up cones on the front. The image of the man in the gates of the bowling club is quite a gem too.

Some Nice Drawings

You can't beat a bit of children's art can you? These are from a book I picked up a while ago from a charity shop. The book seems to be aimed at art teachers in schools and there's lots of nice examples.The book itself was printed in the 60s and I think it was probably published in Germany originally. As you can see there's a fine example of some boys on swings wearing leiderhosen!
The trees drawings remind me a lot of Bryan Pearce's work. (He was one of those Cornish outsider art types from St.Ives).

Quirky Ice Cream

I do like this sign which is displayed at Swanpool Beach cafe. The quirky ice creams consist of large scoops of cornish ice cream which are then covered in suicidal amounts of clotted cream and then they are topped with sweeties of various kinds. I'm sure I have some more photos of handpainted signs here in Falmouth. I will try and dig them out.

Trevarno Vintage Soap Collection

Are you a soap fan? If so maybe you should visit the soap museum at Trevarno near Helston in Cornwall. However, I don't mean Corrie or Eastenders, rather the stuff you wash with. - Its quite small (not much bigger than a garage in fact) but has a good array of vintage packaging and other soap related items.



Some of my favorites are the soaps in the shapes of animals, T.V. and cartoon characters. Who can resist Pobble with the big toes, even though he looks like he is straining to deposit something rather unsavory on his box.

Beware the red -eyed poodle!

A doll a having a bath.


I can only assume that these are some kind of sock and shirt shaping devices.



Trevarno is a good place to visit even if you're not so keen on soap. Actually, the soap museum is really a kind of side-line thing. The Trevarno estate mainly consists of the gardens with peacocks and good children's play area. Its one of the lesser known Cornish gardens so usually relatively tranquil except when there's a special event on.

Herve Morvan Book

My Herve Morvan Book has arrived from amazon and I am very excited about it. If you like his work, then this is essential. Its always a bit of a gamble buying art books when you can't look inside them, so I was a bit worried that it wouldn't have much of the stuff that I like, but I am really pleased as it has loads of really strong work in it and lots that I hadn't seen before. Great ideas , lots to like . Very inspiring. There hasn't been much published about him really, the only other book that I've come across has always been nigh-on impossible to get hold of as its out of print and nowhere seems to have it. I had the idea to compile a book of his work myself and if I hadn't been beaten to it, it would probably have looked very similar to this. He's obviously got a bit of a following in Japan as this is published by a Japanese company. My only criticism is that it doesn't give you much background information and what there is isn't brilliantly translated Perhaps a case of Japanese whispers. Visually a treat though.

My Five Senses by Aliki

This not a new acquisition - I think I got it from a jumble sale many years ago . I keep coming back to it. The limited palette of the screen printing works really well. Sometimes its good to be restricted by something then you just work with what you've got rather than having endless permutations and making lots decisions about the way things should look. I looked to see if you can get it on amazon and its been re-vamped. Not nearly so nice now.

More Lovely Matchbox Labels

So fantastic... I can't get enough of these at the moment. There are several others in this series and I think they date from the early 1970s. Its a pity matchboxes aren't this exciting any more.I remember going on holiday to Spain when I was a kid and spending half the time hanging around bins and litter trying to collect interesting matchboxes. Some things never change...although I have to admit I didn't have to hang around bins in Eastern Europe to get these. If you like this sort of thing - matchbox labels, not foraging in bins, I mean - you might find yourself wanting to buy this book on the subject. (A shameless plug as I used to share a studio with Jane Smith, the author of the book ).Worth a look.